Paying Charon
by MLP
Summary: This one is for Rob and Kristen, who presume to know that we "Need" torture porn. Well, we can do it too. This one is born of rage. It's dark. Very dark. I wouldn't read it if I were you.


Paying Charon

A good day is when I'm too numb to feel anything. On a bad day, I drink until I'm too numb to feel anything.

I have a lot of bad days.

Dad's worried about me. I honestly don't know why; the worst has already happened.

You're probably wondering how long it took me to realize that it was my fault Logan died. Answer: before the shrapnel started hitting the ground. A mean little troll like Penn Epner couldn't have killed Logan. He needed my help and in my arrogance and sloth, I gave it to him.

It was arrogant to assume I had solved the riddle of Epner's limerick. It was both arrogance and sloth to assume he had no failsafe in case the bombing at Kane High was thwarted. It was pure, unadulterated sloth that I didn't check the backseat of my car for Epner's back pack. Epner went all in on the idea that I never took him seriously and when he won that bet, my world was reduced to ashes and pain.

Why didn't I look? I noticed that fucking backpack when he brought it to the car...why didn't I notice it when he left?

Arrogance. Sloth. The wages of sin.

I didn't scream. You need to be able to draw breath to scream and I couldn't do that. I lay on that bed, where I fell, crushed beneath the weight of grief and guilt. I couldn't draw breath. I never screamed for Logan.

He saved me from Beaver but I didn't save him.

Dad found me, right where I had fallen, hours later, paralyzed with grief. I couldn't move from the bed. I couldn't bear the thought of seeing what had actually happened in that street.

You have any idea what it does to a human body to detonate a bomb directly beneath it?

They didn't pick up his remains with a shovel. They used a wet vac.

I didn't cry. The dead don't weep.

Logan would have been better off if he'd never called me when he was accused of Carrie's death. He could afford the best criminal defense attorneys in the nation and since he was innocent, any of them would have gotten him off. And I'd be stuck in some 80 hour a week, dull as fuck corporate job in New York but Logan would be alive. I'd make that trade.

If I had said 'yes' when he first asked me to marry him, he'd be alive. We'd have been on our Honeymoon when the bombings happened and I wouldn't have gotten involved. Why the fuck didn't I say yes?

For that matter, why didn't I ask him to marry me, years ago? If I could do it over, I would do so many things differently. We lost nine years. That was my fault, too. Logan apologized for hurting me but I couldn't...wouldn't forgive him. I held my pride as more valuable than us. I regret every minute of those nine years we were apart. We should have had kids by now. Logan wanted kids. He wanted a family. He never really had one and he wanted to make one with me. I was too afraid to take that step. Is fear a deadly sin? It should be. Now the worst has happened and I can't remember what I was afraid of. All I know is I'll never have Logan's baby. Now that it can never happen, I want it more than anything. Greed. If I could do it over, I'd have twelve of his babies. Gluttony. If I could do it over, I'd have done what made Logan happy instead of only ever EVER thinking of myself.

But I can't do anything over.

I haven't been able to see Wallace. He tried to be there for me he's always been there for me but I just can't. I can't face him. I envy him so much it feels like hatred. He has everything I could have given Logan but wouldn't.

Pride. Sloth. Envy. Hate.

A wet vac.

I wish I believed in God. I wish I believed that Logan was waiting for me in some distant Heaven and that I'd be with him again. I even tried to pray, once. I just couldn't do it.

I need a drink.

Or six.

Dad's worried about me but he shouldn't be. Drinking isn't going to kill me. My new boyfriend will take care of that.

Yeah, I met someone. No, it's not some starry eyed romance. I'll never do that again. That part of me was reduced to a pink mist at 5:00 on my wedding day.

Pride. Sloth. Greed. Gluttony. Envy. Hate. Lust.

I'm in Hell and I know exactly how I got here.

Anyway. New boyfriend. We did_ not_ meet cute.

In fact, he wasn't at all happy to see me when I slithered onto a bar stool at the River Styx but I think he was impressed by my ability to down three shots of whiskey in quick succession. Liam Fitzpatrick never knew my mother.

"Damn, Mars. Most women your size would be under the bar after that much hooch." He said.

"I don't get wobbly until my fifth." I told him, indicating I wanted him to pour number four. "So if you're gonna take me into that back office of yours and fuck my brains out, you'd better do it now."

So he did.

I'd really only wanted his attention; I had a plan. I swear, I had no idea that was going to come out of my mouth until I heard my own voice. But once it was out there, I couldn't think of a reason not to go through with it.

So I did.

He had condoms in the desk drawer but I said "I didn't come here for_ safe_ sex, you pussy." After that, he never offered to wrap it up again.

I realized I'd come to the River Styx for more than just vengeance: I'd come to do penance for all my sins.

Pride doesn't stand a chance in a situation as humiliating as what Liam did to me in that office. I had found where I belonged.

In the middle ages, religious folks would wear hair shirts and practice self flagellation in atonement for their sins. They called it 'mortification' and considered it necessary for achieving the proper humility before God. I totally get it; the relief of finding something I could do that was so..._ vile_ that it equaled the weight of my guilt was so overwhelming, I finally cried. There were no tears but I sobbed. Liam thought he had rocked my world. You can't rock a world that's made of ashes and pink mist, dumbshit.

So now I'm the girlfriend of a vicious criminal old enough to be my father.

It was the vicious part I needed.

He was still inside me when I asked my favor.

"You think I'll do that just because I boned you?" He asked, pulling out of me.

"Can you do it?"

"I can do it. I know plenty a' guys in the federal pen." He looked me up and down. I must have been a sight, sitting on that desk in nothing but my T-shirt and boots.

"I'm not trading sex for favors." I said, as he ogled. "I'll pay for favors."

"Yeah? then what was this all about?" he asked, pulling his jeans up and tucking himself in.

"got your attention, didn't I?"

"You got more than that."

"You're a pretty decent fuck for an old man." I said.

"You got a mouth on you." He said sternly.

"I do." I said. "But what I need is your juice on the inside."

"That's what you just got." He grinned.

"Touché. So what will it cost for you to get someone to do this job?"

"Depends. Five grand. Maybe ten if things get tricky."

"Oh, I want tricky." I told him exactly what I wanted. He whistled.

"That could get pricey." He said.

"I'll pay." I said. "He never makes trial and he suffers every day for the rest of his short life."

He agreed to it. I figured he would. It was an opportunity for him to burnish his reputation by getting to a federal prisoner and make a tidy sum while doing it. I didn't simply want Epner put to death. No, I wanted Liam to find someone who could put Epner _to the pain._ I wanted someone who would take his hands, his feet, his tongue, nose and one eye. I wanted Epner to be dismembered, as his victims were. I want him to live like that until the eve of his trial but then to be gutted like a fish, left to bleed out in the shower before he got his day in court. I want him to suffer. And then I really, really want Hell to be real so he can continue suffering for all eternity.

I thought Logan would appreciate it. He loved the Princess Bride.

I had no plans to go back to the River Styx once I'd reached a deal with Liam.

But every night in my dreams, I see Logan smile up at me, then explode into a nebula of human flesh. I tear myself awake to escape the nightmare but awake is worse. There is no escape. No escape but oblivion... and penance. Every few days, the guilt becomes unbearable. I miss Logan so much I can actually_ see _the abyss stretching black and bottomless in front of me.

So I return to the River Styx.

Three shots and a screw in that back office. For fifteen minutes or so, I don't have to remember anything.

So that's our relationship.

I can't explain it but it helps. I don't dream on those nights. Maybe it's the whiskey. Maybe it's the sex. Maybe there is a God.

Want to know how Liam and I became exclusive? Couple of weeks after it started, I'd been back in the office with Liam four or five times, I certainly didn't think of us as a couple, just, you know; fuck buddies. So when he wasn't around one night when I went in, I didn't think anything of it, just ordered my usual. I have no idea who the bartender was; couldn't pick him out of a line up of Fitzpatricks but he was more than happy to fill my order. I thought nothing of it but the next time I went in, right after he finished, Liam inked a shamrock tattoo on me in a spot my father will never see. None of the other guys will touch me now.

Does't it just set your heart aflutter?

I don't even remember what pride felt like.

A wet vac.

The first attack on Epner was last week. They snipped off eight of his toes before the guards stopped it.

I'd have been delighted if I were still capable of feeling anything.

After he delivered the news, in appropriately gory detail, Liam pushed me onto the couch...

Penance is good for the soul.

It'll be a while before Epner is out of the prison hospital. When that happens, Liam's got a guy who will take his nose, tongue and an eye. Only one. I want Epner to _see it_ when they take his hands.

Dad's worried about my drinking. The whiskey is the least of it. At the River Styx, I've found the place where the woman who killed Logan Echolls belongs. In that back office, I've found my station. My mortification.

Once Epner is dead, I have a plan for my own future, as well. At the rate we're going, I'll be cleansed of every last shred of my sins and I'll be ready to die. I'm going to pick a fight with Liam. It'll be easy to make him angry enough to kill me.

If there is any kind of afterlife, I'll have paid dearly for all my sins.

I can hardly wait.


End file.
